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TRIZ in BAE Systems (the Consultants story)

It all started so long ago – in 1998 presenting TRIZ to an energetic Bob Robinson and open

minded Pauline Marsh was like pushing on an open door – they loved everything they heard

about TRIZ and in a few weeks we were running our first 3-day TRIZ Workshop in the

Directors Box of the Raebok Football stadium to a very mixed group of senior management,

engineering directors and innovation enthusiasts.

Since then we have trained over 1000 BAE Systems’ engineers and run problem solving

sessions (some 3 months long some only 2 days) on many subjects including:-

Next generation submarines

Detailed Functions needed for submarines

Weapons systems

Cabin air contamination from engine oil

Establishing TRIZ in a global company This is based on practitioners’ experience of a 14 year journey establishing TRIZ in a global company – BAE Systems. The practitioners include the external TRIZ consultant Karen Gadd of Oxford Creativity and the customer – Pauline Marsh a director of BAE Systems. The real success stories (now published case studies) were critical for its acceptance but there were also false starts, dead ends and unexpected benefits which changed the way TRIZ was presented, practised and adopted. This paper explores both what worked and what didn’t work, highlighting the key ingredients for success and the unexpected benefits which TRIZ delivers beyond innovation and problem solving.

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Redesign of drogue for mid air refuelling

Escape systems from submarines

Aircraft training systems optimum locations

Flight measurement systems

Inertia of aircraft

Protection from debris on runways

Location of airports in remote locations

Management of airports

Design of aircraft components

Persuading UK Government to change/clarify the regulations for aircraft maintenance for

Royal Air Force

Innovation Culture change for processes and non-TRIZ toolkits

and many, many more....

Many ways of getting TRIZ into big companies

TRIZ gets everyone in different ways and enthusiasts all have their own solutions for how to

teach it, how to problem solve and how to get it established in global companies. This is the

story of 14 years of TRIZ in BAE Systems, which has taken some interesting directions for

Oxford Creativity, often guided by the enthusiasm of influential managers within BAE.

One of the fundamental truths of TRIZ is that there are many, many possible and good

solutions to most problems. Getting TRIZ accepted and embedded in large companies is just

such a problem - there are many ways of succeeding and this BAE Systems story is just

one.

The international and successful BAE Systems describe themselves as....... ‘a global

defence and security company employing around 100,000 people worldwide. Our wide-

ranging products and services cover air, land and naval forces, as well as advanced

electronics, security, information technology, and support services’

BAE System’s large technical population, containing some the world’s top engineers,

responded well to TRIZ and achieved a great deal. Oxford Creativity always enjoyed working

with such clever and motivated managers, engineers, scientists, new graduates and

directors on a very wide range of issues which ranged from next generation submarines to

top management problems, involving the company’s future, to smaller challenges such as

the design of individual components or decisions on proportions of make/buy.

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Oxford TRIZ has been available to everyone in BAE Systems for over 14 years and was

available to whole teams or individuals who can simply register for the Oxford TRIZ

workshops. As a result a wide mix of BAE Systems people from all over the world learn TRIZ

each year. The journey has been an interesting one and took quite a lot of perseverance and

TRIZ success to get it all working. There were obstacles and pitfalls to overcome, some false

starts and some surprises. Every company is unique and needs different approaches

however, and in taking TRIZ into Global companies there are many difficulties which are

common to all and we met these listed below initially at BAE.

How to meet the Challenges and overcome inertia

It is a big challenge to take TRIZ into a big company – there is resistance to ...

1. Adding to the more famous and well established toolkits

2. Accepting a little known Russian toolkit with poor PR

3. Reaching and persuading the right people to maintain the momentum (HR and Training

departments don’t initially understand the power of TRIZ)

4. Oxford TRIZ practices of taking time to define right direction to take, with the real problem.

This is achieved by rigorously sharing (& developing with TRIZ) everyone’s solutions - ideas

from the whole team - and not just senior management’s ‘Bad Solutions’.

5. Getting the top management and the engineering population to appreciate the unique power

of TRIZ for their challenges and commit to regular TRIZ training for everyone who wants it

6. Making it easily and quickly accessible to everyone once it has been shown to help the

company solve their problems

The last four of these were overcome, the first two are a little harder, more general, long

term and more problematic. The more famous and well established toolkits have their

devoted champions and occasionally a newly promoted manager will announce to his

department something like “the only toolkit we need is Kepner-Tregoe” and only use such an

RCA tool for everything despite its limited scope of only uncovering problems and its lack of

any problem solving content. These mangers come and go but while they stay they can stop

TRIZ for their whole team. In the meantime the reputation and accessibility of TRIZ will

continue to grow, and I hope we have helped a little with this with the OC approaches,

cartoons and publications.

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Who uses TRIZ and Why?

Persuading BAE Systems to take on TRIZ globally required proof of its power as a problem

solving kit, and demonstrating in practical terms just how Oxford Creativity could release that

power to its engineers in only 5 days of training. For good engineers TRIZ offers the best of

all worlds: the individual tools are straightforward, the problem-solving process is systematic

and repeatable, and when we move fast with TRIZ we can uncover all the possible solutions

and maintain and use our brains at their most creative. Teaching that in five days requires

great efficiency and effectiveness and we developed the five days training especially for

BAE, and although the training was designed for engineers we found it worked well for

everyone who attended. It must be said however that engineers understand TRIZ better than

anyone else because it comes from engineering success. It was developed by engineers for

engineers, and although TRIZ works well on anything, it seems to work best on engineering

problems.

When first hearing of TRIZ, however, most engineers resist it, perhaps because it sounds

too good to be true; but also maybe because it is new to them, not-invented-here and

counter-intuitive to the way they approach problems. Unfortunately TRIZ is also seen as

just another part of the overcrowded market in corporate toolkits (which range from

excellent to trivial). Taking on a new toolkit makes demands on their brain power, company

time and money and other hard-pressed resources, and this requires belief in its efficacy

and power. Six Sigma and Lean are both promoted to improve efficiency and deliver cost

savings and therefore widely adopted – TRIZ also delivers efficiency and similar cost

savings plus innovation, fast problem solving and clear thinking.

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It was essential that Oxford Creativity could demonstrate that TRIZ is a unique addition to all

the other toolkits used within BAE Systems, as it supplements and complements them all

and fills in their missing essentials – the big hole they all possess of no directed problem

solving to relevant solution concepts. TRIZ & Lean, TRIZ & Systems Engineering, TRIZ &

TOC...papers on all of these were presented as required and published by our consultants to

show how TRIZ fits with and completes the toolkits.

Making Oxford TRIZ easily, consistently & quickly accessible to

everyone (100,000 people) in BAE Systems

The challenge of how to make TRIZ available to everyone from one source without adding

anything (and with no new complications, extra costs or problems) is very simple and is

answered by TRIZ as ‘Use the resources you’ve got’. The resources at BAE Systems were

the Life Cycle Management System (LCMS) and the BAE Systems training portals which

were run by Xchanging.

LCMS explicitly mapped which tools to use when and TRIZ appears several times

particularly when innovation, problem solving and new concepts are required. The Oxford

TRIZ workshops were registered on the BAE Systems training systems. Xchanging

publicised the dates of the Oxford TRIZ workshops, handled bookings, payments etc, and

ensured that the global but very disparate and uneven demand for TRIZ was recorded and

satisfied. Oxford Creativity did everything else from booking the rooms to individual

accommodation as well as the Workshops themselves.

The system worked fairly well for many years (a new one has been put in place recently as

Xchanging lost their contract with BAE Systems). Therefore one great element of consistent

success was that Oxford TRIZ was the BAE Systems chosen solution for innovation,

problem solving, concept generation etc. This meant that no one had to explain’ what is

TRIZ’ in order to register for training or request problem solving. TRIZ training was available

to anyone through the company wide training portal.

When there was demand for a big project - training many people and involving much

problem solving – then other TRIZ providers were invited to bid and were considered. In the

last 14 years Oxford Creativity were always selected, except on one occasion, when both

Oxford Creativity and a Barrow Consultancy were both given the same problem to work in

parallel to see how they compared and TRIZ added value. Oxford Creativity and TRIZ came

out on top with better solutions, faster results and considerably lower budget despite the cost

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being in five figures for OC alone. This project involved training over 100 people in TRZ and

then running TRIZ sessions which enabled them to find the best possible solutions

themselves. Results were innovative, useful, relevant and at times groundbreaking.

Getting top management & the engineers to appreciate the unique power

of TRIZ & commit to regular TRIZ training for everyone who wants it

The challenge of persuading the budget holders, the decision makers and those who have to

organise the training is harder with TRIZ than say Six Sigma which encourages everyone to

claim huge savings as a result of any Six Sigma activity. TRIZ does not have this culture

(although solved problems always save money), quantifying this perhaps needs some

development for everyone in TRIZ.

So how did it work so well in BAE Systems? Probably helped by the following:-

OC TRIZ trained for practical problem solving not for theoretical TRIZ

Workshops were made available regularly and completely organised by OC putting no

burden on anyone in BAE Systems (except for marketing and booking for which a system

already existed and was simply slotted in)

TRIZ Workshops were consistent and flexible (opting in for anything from one day to five

days was always possible and often happened)

Oxford TRIZ demands full participation from everyone with several big exercises each day,

carefully designed and organised on large A0 pre-printed sheets for groups of 3-5 people

All TRIZ material was clear, fun easy to use and seen on desks for many years after the

training and worked for international groups

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Feedback was always enthusiastic

OC were flexible and available at short notice – we have over 12 experienced consultants –

so when work was suddenly needed in Saudi Arabia (many workshop there) – or next day

problem solving – we nearly always able to help

TRIZ training led to problem solving abilities especially when teams worked together

... and much more as explained below

TRIZ Training – Train for Practical Problem Solving

Oxford Creativity developed the special BAE Systems TRIZ training workshops to teach

delegates not about all of TRIZ but how to problem solve using the TRIZ toolkit. The training

was devised to be effective for problem solving, for everyone, and to be fast, effective fun

and consistent – and to work for everyone.

It was devised as a 5-day TRIZ Workshop – segmented as five 1-day workshops so

participants can take their TRIZ as a 5-day course, five 1-day courses or something in

between – the flexibility of undertaking the TRIZ training at a pace to suit their other

commitments. TRIZ workshops have always worked well within BAE. One great persuader

for its continuance and take up was the consistent quality of the results and the fact that it is

a repeatable process. However the TRIZ Training – no matter how well received and useful

does not persuade as well or as successfully as problem solving.

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Getting top management and the engineering population to

appreciate the unique power of TRIZ for their challenges

There is an English saying ‘The proof of the pudding is in the eating’ – we might say that

‘The proof of TRIZ is in the problem solving’. Whenever Oxford Creativity want to establish a

new relationship we offer to help a team solve their most difficult problems – as we find that

only this truly convinces people of how TRIZ will transform their thinking, their problem

solving abilities and their achievements.

In BAE Systems Pauline Marsh invented a very ingenious, quick and efficient method for

sampling TRIZ problem solving – the TRIZ Master-Class. This involved TRIZ trained

engineers attempting to solve their most challenging problems with TRIZ, on returning to

their offices after their training, and then 4 or 5 groups of problem solvers presenting their

results to Oxford Creativity and BAE Systems top management. These sessions had enough

time allotted to not only judge their results, but also revisit the problem solving and improve,

expand and extend it as necessary. This proved to be very successful, very motivating, good

for solving difficult, previously ‘unsolvable’ problems and great fun. Several problems were

solved in this way including the problem described in the Flight measurement systems

Case-study.

In many other areas there was much TRIZ problem solving in a more traditional and

thorough TRIZ manner directed and assisted by OC TRIZ consultants – these solved many

problems and varied in time from a few days to a few months. Granting sufficient time to

problem solving is always seen as a luxury no matter how important or urgent the problem,

and BAE Systems is no exception to this, but once TRIZ was accepted as useful and shown

to be very time efficient it became easier to achieve.

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One important aspect of persuading anyone (particularly engineers) that TRIZ works is to

show them its simple logic. Each tool has its own straightforward algorithm and in Oxford

TRIZ we strive to keep everything both simple and rigorous. Our flow charts for problem

solving helps everyone understand where they are going, where they have been and how to

go there again (leaving a good audit trail). This builds confidence and self efficacy which

helps build happy and creative teams.

Using simple maps such as the one above helps newcomers get started. Once problems are

solved with TRIZ then confidence begins to build, in finding solutions every-time. TRIZ

problem solving sessions can produce brilliant and retrospectively obvious solutions, which

invokes incredulous comments like ‘this was always right in front of our noses ‘and ‘we had

this possibility all along but couldn’t see it’. When less thrilling but still very good solutions

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are produced, but with no obvious winner, the TRIZ tools such as an Ideality Audit simply

helps us rank the solutions.

Problem Solving- often has insufficient time allocated & is not audited or understood

In many major companies minimum time is given to the actual problem-solving stage despite its critical

importance often to the future of the company and its outputs. This is curious, but it seems that without

a systematic approach like TRIZ, the rare, very rationed and valuable problem-solving time may only be

productive for a short period and may not be yielding much, once the initial bursts of mental energy and

the sharing of ideas /solutions have petered out. Comments from new TRIZ users often include ‘Before

we would have managed half a day and then stopped with some goodish ideas, but TRIZ kept us busy

and usefully engaged for much longer and we have produced so many more and much stronger

solutions’. TRIZ helps everyone fully use real problem solving time effectively, and keeps team

members engaged and mentally alert throughout (which stimulates the best thinking power, creativity,

knowledge and experience).

With TRIZ we can also audit and track the investment of innovation and problem solving time, detailing

all processes followed; without such systematic tracking problem solving time may become patchy, hard

to measure, use, maintain, assess and recapture – making much needed future sessions harder to

justify, especially on occasions when the true success is only retrospective, and the effectiveness of the

solutions can only be proved much later. In BAE some solved problems are so secret we can never

reveal them (even within OC) and some we can reveal after many years. The complete confidentiality

OC has maintained is part of our success – we have the right consultants and we are trusted.

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Unexpected Benefits of TRIZ - Happy, communicative and effective teams

The unexpected benefits of team building came about through the Oxford TRIZ culture of the

BAD SOLUTIONS (essential for fast uncovering of contradictions, full participation of the

whole team and idea sharing). Bad Solution Parks also overcome the difficulty of introducing

TRIZ to those who think Brainstorming = Problem Solving. Convincing confident managers

that TRIZ offers so much more than brainstorming is essential to extend and improve the

problem solving sessions.

Brainstorming is wonderful and an essential first stage of the TRIZ problem solving.

However it has its pitfalls and often throws up solutions which intoxicate their owner and can

set us off in the wrong direction – such situations have often been much helped by the

cartoon below.

Persuading any company to have a consistent policy for problem solving is difficult. For

major companies such as BAE Systems problem solving is both complex and varied. It

defies most simple attempts at categorization as it is needed in all areas of business and

decision making and at all stages of creating and using systems. Problems can range from

simple (easy to solve) to very difficult (require innovative solutions) and furthermore different

problems need different experience and knowledge to match them to the right solutions.

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Brainstorming on its own often works on simple problems and sometimes works on difficult

problems. Our challenge in big companies is to show how TRIZ consistently works on both,

with a focused brainstorm as the first step of its systematic process, taking us much further

until we are able to uncover most, if not all, of the relevant strong solutions.

TRIZ helps us solve many different kinds of problems, as it offers a variety of approaches

according to the type of problem and level of complexity and difficulty. Therefore the first

achievements in big companies should involve helping them solve as many and as different

types of problems as possible, from director strategic problems to shop-floor problems and

everything in between. This is what we did at BAE Systems in many different areas and over

many years.

Brainstorming suits some but not others and has the hazard that quick thinking and over-

confident management may sometimes get their inferior ideas accepted in a team

brainstorm. The culture of an Oxford TRIZ session helped to break this with much humour

and goodwill on all sides, especially at its first stage of gathering all ideas from all team

members and then allowing everyone to both praise and criticize them. This was not for

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fairness but essential to TRIZ processes of quickly understanding everything we want, and

then capturing everyone’s first ideas of how best to achieve it (these ideas are the beginning

of the TRIZ problem solving process).

In Oxford TRIZ we encourage everyone to capture and be proud of their initial ideas

however we also foster idea sharing; so in a spirit of real or assumed humility we ask that

these initial ideas all be labeled BAD Solutions and put in a BAD Solution Park. The next

step is that everyone openly explores what is bad and good about each idea, which

uncovers all contradictions in the suggested solutions (TRIZ shows us just 40 ways of

solving any contradiction). This also encourages open, fair rational praise and criticism, by

exploring the real benefits delivered in each Bad Solution (and all downsides), and enables

the rough ranking of solutions as starting points for the TRIZ process to ensure that they at

least deliver the essential purpose of what we are seeking, before they are subjected to

TRIZ processes and transformed by TRIZ to BEST Solutions.

As participants at a good TRIZ sessions we can enjoy all the fun of brainstorming by starting

to capture everyone’s initial BAD Solutions, whilst we work together to understand what we

know about the problem and its context, and also to define why we are solving this problem.

We then brainstorm with a quick focused exercise to define what we really, really want

(defining the Ideal Solution), which often unleashes everyone’s brainpower, energy and

enthusiasm. This generates much understanding of requirements, as well as many good

ideas of how to achieve what we want (more Bad Solutions), so that we all have the

opportunity to use our brains at a high octane level, engage our creative talents and access

our relevant knowledge. This does not deny the chance to make those satisfying jumps to

solutions, enjoyable Eureka moments, at any point from the beginning to the end of the

process. Because TRIZ is always pointing us in the right direction and moving us closer to

the good solutions, we will be always making smaller (and much more probable) leaps to the

right answers.

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TRIZ (although consistent and simple) is different for everyone yet still

establishes a Collaborative Culture, and a common language

TRIZ gets to everyone in different ways. One essential truth about TRIZ is that it is

much more about prodding the brain rather than using other solutions. That’s why

when you put TRIZ in front of an original thinker they see lots more solutions to their

problems immediately. Prod a good brain effectively and you’ll get what looks like

miracles, prod any brain with TRIZ and something wonderful happens.

Initially when promoting TRIZ in BAE Systems there was some resistance even from the

original thinkers – those few who had heard of it were hesitant as they perceived it as a

complex toolkit, hard to master and apply. This is a misapprehension, as each TRIZ tool is

fairly simple and straightforward and learning the entire toolkit should offer no problems for

engineers (or anyone). Although TRIZ is quite a large and rigorous toolkit many of the tools

overlap, as TRIZ is designed to suit all types of problem solvers. Part of the genius of

TRIZ is that it was developed to allow individuals to build their own, personal TRIZ toolkit

which suits their problem solving style best. This is a bit like having a well-equipped gym

with a large range of equipment – individuals choose and use only part of that equipment

depending on what suits them and which fitness problem they are tackling. The TRIZ Toolkit

is much the same – there are tools which have specific purposes and tools which work in

many ways on different problems and an individual finds suit them well, and which they

will use extensively.

TRIZ also helps us all to think more clearly – part of its power is that when we follow its

processes it breaks our Psychological Inertia by helping us completely understand our

problem – seeing both everything we want and ways to achieve it. This broader, clearer

thinking breaks everyone out of their previous partial view of the problem and their

infatuation with the first solutions which occurred to them. This builds consensus to properly

understand the real problem, and find as many valid answers as possible.